Happiness and Pain
by NessieGG
Summary: [12 Ichigo Tortures] [IchiRuki] Where there is pain there can also be happiness. Where there is happiness, there is pain.
1. Learning To Deal

**A/N**: Twelve drabbles/one-shots written for the IchiRuki community on Live Journal.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Bleach…nope.

**Happiness and Pain**

"Learning To Deal"

By Nessie

It isn't enough that he has his own demons to handle, those shadows that claw at his Shinigami robes and sink their teeth into his dreams. Rukia's haunt him as well. Every time he thinks of her in that tall, white tower – alone, collared like an animal, thrust into darkness – Ichigo can only ask himself why he didn't get there sooner.

She goes to bed in his closet, shutting the door with a firm click, and he stares at the door for a long while, wondering how she can stand staying in another cramped, black space. Self-blame squeezes his heart. Some nights he wakes to hear her murmuring in distress, still sleeping. He has to curl the pillow around his ears but even then her voice breaks into his brain.

It finally becomes too much to bear because Ichigo knows that even if Rukia was resigned to her apparent fate in reality, she cannot lie to herself in her sleep. That is the difference between what could have happened and what did happen. He can _feel _her trembling.

Getting out of bed, he goes to the shut closet door. A wooden panel separates them. But not for long.

If necessary, Ichigo will show her again and again; he can learn to deal with his own phantoms. And hers.


	2. Security Report

**Happiness and Pain**

"Security Report"

By Nessie

Ichigo used to believe that the worst possible thing that could happen to him was he would fail. At everything.

Now, sitting across a perfectly-varnished table, drinking from a teacup that was sure to be antique (if Soul Society considered things antiques), he decided there was something just a little bit worse. And waiting for Kuchiki Byakuya to tell him why he had been summoned to the uncomfortably grand Kuchiki house was precisely it.

Eventually, Byakuya set down his teacup with flawless movement and met his eyes. "Kurosaki," he said, "why was I informed by the security department this morning that you were discovered in an empty training room with my sister?"

Ichigo's stomach stretched out, knotted, and flipped over. "Uh...what?"

"An empty training room," the noble repeated, his voice infallibly steady, "with my sister. In an intimate position."

His mind screamed RETREAT but his guts would allow no such thing. Going with the next idea he had, Ichigo played dumb. "Like...what?"

Byakuya appeared to lose some of his chronic perfection when a hair fell out of place over his shoulder. "The report I was given described the action as 'tongue lashing'."

Ichigo wanted to die. And, gauging from Byakuya's face, Rukia's brother wanted the very same for him.


	3. Dollop

**Happiness and Pain**

"Dollop"

By Nessie

Rukia didn't much like the cappuccinos Ichigo would stop to get on the way to school during the fall and winter months. Her palate was like a five-year-old's – no coffee, just milkshakes or juice that, despite all his efforts, Ichigo could _not _train her to poke into herself.

Which meant taking time to do it for her, which mean his cappuccino losing heat, which left him irritated as hell, etc.

The solution to this problem Rukia offered on an ordinary Thursday morning was one Ichigo had to suck in his cheeks to keep from laughing at. "Just order a dollop of whipped cream on top of it."

"I don't like whipped cream," he told her shortly. Mist puffed from her mouth in the icy air. She fisted her gloved hands on her hips and scowled at him.

"It's so _both _of us are happy," Rukia said as though this were the most obvious thing in the world. "The whipped cream will, you know, insulate your coffee. Keep the warmth in."

The look he afforded her was one of utter disbelief. "I really don't think that's gonna—"

But she had already motioned for the barista to add a dollop of whipped cream onto his coffee. Ichigo went along, inwardly mourning for his (in his estimation) ruined cappuccino. "It makes it too sweet," he started to grumble.

It was her turn to laugh, but she made no show of hiding it, inconsiderate little sprite that she was. But, to Ichigo, damnably cute with her cheeks pink from the cold.

"Open my juice, Ichigo."

He sighed, relenting because he knew that if he didn't she would only keep pestering him until he impaled the little box with the straw. He did so quickly, taking his cappuccino and wishing he had stopped the barista from adding the whipped cream.

"Now, pass me your cup." Obediently, he lowered the to-go plastic coffee cup to her level. She attacked it, her tongue swirling over and around the rim of the cup in…interesting ways. Per normal of teenage boys, he felt instantly agonized. Ichigo's eyebrows darted up and didn't come down until she looked up at him, the cream completely gone. "It's not bad at all," Rukia upheld. "Try it!"

"How can I try it," he demanded in annoyance, a little sad that it was all gone, "when you just ate it all?" She gave him his answer by yanking hard on the trailing end of his scarf until he was bent over, and she rose on tiptoe to fuse her lips to his. Traces of sweetness coated her lips, and Ichigo found something definitely likeable about the taste.

"See?" Rukia queried when he straightened, clouds of breath rushing out.

The grin he gave her suggested that he had overcome his suffering, though the way Rukia smile back only increased it tenfold. "Order a bigger dollop tomorrow."


	4. 100 Degrees and Rising

**Happiness and Pain**

"100 Degrees and Rising"

By Nessie

"Ichigoooooooooooooooooo!"

This siren-like call of his name was followed by a vicious racking of his body as Kurosaki Ichigo was mercilessly pounced on by a four-foot-nine bundle of dynamite. His eyes popped open to see Rukia's face uncomfortably close to his, the wide grin she wore instantly terrifying him.

"What. Do. You Want," he ground out. Since he had just woken up, however, he did not quite reach the desired effect and sounded more startled than threatening.

"Guess what!" Satisfied that he was no longer sleeping, Rukia slid off of him. Ichigo's muddled brain was slow-working, but his body quickly caught onto the realization that Rukia had just rolled herself over his thighs. The result of that happening was making itself known, and he sat up in a hurry so she wouldn't notice.

"Can't guess," he replied, adding in a grumble, "Has Dad made coffee?"

"Dunno." Not caring a bit for his undercaffeinated state, the Shinigami made a sudden twirl of elation. "Ishida has a _pool _and he said we could _use it_!"

Ichigo slapped a hand to his forehead and slowly squashed it down his face. "You woke me up," he clarified, "because you want to go swimming? So go swimming."

The pout she gave him was infuriating and adorable simultaneously, and he hated her for it. "Ishida had to go train with Chad, and no one else is gonna be there! I can't go by myself!"

"I wanted to sleep _in _today, Rukia."

But as usual, the Kuchiki spared his personal opinion of the situation no thought whatsoever, and before he could even stop for breakfast, he had been talked into changing into a bathing suit and walking over to Ishida's in ninety-five degree heat.

"Now I'm tired _and _hungry," he declared, trying to wish himself back into bed and failing. Rukia responded with a reminder that one should not eat before swimming anyhow. Then she removed the beach towel she had wrapped around her (twice) to walk to Ishida's.

And Ichigo thought he would die of a heart attack before he died of starvation.

Rukia's swimsuit was dark purple, the color bringing out her eyes, but she could have worn a clashing yellow and brown and would still have produced the same effect from Ichigo (which was much like the one she had produced earlier that morning). The cut left her hips completely bare, with practically no material over her back, and the neckline plunged so far Ichigo could see…well, a _lot_.

"Where the hell did you get that?" He didn't know whether to cover his eyes or circle her for a better look.

She smiled up at him so innocently Ichigo wondered if she even knew she was hardly decent. "Rangiku-san helped me pick it out."

Ichigo thought of the well-endowed vice captain and remembered that Matsumoto knew how to perfectly display every single curve. Then he was _sure _Rukia knew exactly what she looked like.

The temperature speared up to one hundred and, as Rukia slowly moved toward him, kept rising. She placed one small hand on his bare chest and tilted her head sideways, feigning lack of notice to his expression. "Your cheeks are red, Ichigo. You should cool off." With that, she gave the tiniest of shoves and Ichigo fell into the icy pool water, flailing all the way.

God, she was mean.

Because the only thing worse (and by worse he meant better) than a half-naked Rukia was a _wet _half-naked Rukia.


	5. Under The Weather

**Happiness and Pain**

"Under The Weather"

By Nessie

Everyone that knew him would not deny that Kurosaki Ichigo was tough. He had fought enemies of escalating strength: school bullies, Hollows, Shinigami, Arrancar. He had even fought _himself _and come out the other side a victor.

So how was it (and he really wanted to know) that he could be put down with something as freaking wussy as the flu?

Rukia had been terrified for him when his symptoms had begun. That moment was one of the few he had not spent half-strapped to his bed for the last three days, courtesy of his father. Even when Karin had explained to her that influenza was treated with relative ease these days and that their clinician father would take care of him, the petite Shinigami had responded with doubt.

She stayed in his room as a go-between for him and the rest of their friends. Urahara had assured her that her gigai wouldn't contract the illness as well. Ichigo derived a rather pathetic satisfaction from her willingness to help him. She even did some of the homework that was sent from school. He should have been content with a few days off and Rukia's new-found ability to let him get some rest, but her initial reaction to his dropped body temperature and his seemingly unstoppably tremors kept nagging at him.

"So what is it?" he demanded when she returned to his room from a mission, refilled glass of juice in hand. He took a sip while she asked what he was talking about, then met her gaze. "What happened that made you freak out like that?"

Rukia's eyes widened momentarily, then lowered to a point on the far side of the room. "What makes you think something happened?"

"People don't freak out for no reason."

She seemed to acknowledge this as truth and replied honestly and with a quickness that surprised him. "When I was alive – in my first life," she clarified, "there wasn't a simple treatment for what you call the flu. Hardly anyone survived it. That shivering you did…that racking, it was like the herald of death back then."

Ichigo's eyebrows drew together. "Rukia…"

"And when I saw you doing that, even in this time, I was afraid." Her hand fisted and pressed above her heart. "I have seen what is beyond death, Ichigo. And while a worse fate could await a person, I do not think you should have to go any sooner than your time." She lifted her eyes to his.

He surprised her – and himself – by reaching out and letting his much larger hand seemingly devour her small one. "Rukia, did…did _you _die from the flu?"

Her smile came slowly, as though she had known he would guess. "It was a time too long ago to matter anymore," she told him simply. "You will be well. And I…" Standing, she purposely drew away. "I will be better because of that."

The thought of her, hundreds of years before, suffering from this very illness without the modern conveniences of over-the-counter medicine and electrically-heated blankets, somehow placed a very heavy weight on Ichigo's mind. He stared at the window long after Rukia jumped through it, feeling torn.

Given the choice, he would always rather _he _was sick. Not Rukia.


	6. Blanket Hog

**Happiness and Pain**

"Blanket Hog" 

By Nessie

Ishida smirked. Orihime looked worried. Chad was uncomfortable.

There was nothing nearly awkward as sitting at lunch with your usual group of people, and two of them weren't talking to each other. And of course, it was the two most intense people in the circle of friends. Per the norm, Orihime did her best to break the ice.

"So…Rukia-san, would you like to try some of my mustard-filled doughnut?" The taller girl held out the "dessert" rather cautiously.

Rukia turned a far-too-bright smile to her. "Of _course _I would, Orihime. It's so nice to know that someone here is kind and willing to share and offer what they have, however small it may be."

Sitting across from him, Chad noticed the way Ichigo's crossed arms tightened.

Ishida's bespectacled eyes darted between the Shinigami and her one-time substitute. The expression he wore was nothing short of gleeful. "Rukia-san, if you want, I could make you a new skirt much better than the one you're wearing now."

"You would? How kind!" Rukia exclaimed, her grin so big it seemed her face would easily crack.

"Here's a napkin," said Chad blandly when he noticed that there was a leak in her juice box and there was liquid running down her wrist.

"_Everyone _is being so kind today!" She accepted the napkin with more enthusiasm than the act usually required.

As she cleaned herself up, everyone fell back into wordlessness as awkward as before, only Ichigo seemed even tenser. It wasn't until the harsh sound of air rushing through the straw from Rukia's empty juice box that the orange-haired teenager whirled to face her, eyes like daggers.

"WOULD YOU DROP IT ALREADY?"

"You talked _first_!" Rukia shouted. "I win!"

"It's not a damn game! If you weren't so unthankful—"

"_I'm _unthankful?"

"I bought you that skirt!"

The heads of Ishida, Orihime, and Chad all moved between the two as they yelled at each other, their manners those of tennis spectators.

"You were the one who wouldn't share the covers last night, Ichigo!" Rukia accused.

He practically seethed at her, "I told you I didn't know! Do you have to scream it out like that?"

Their friends' faces had all gone a brilliant shade of ruby.

"It was cold in your room! And you never turn up the thermal-skate thing…"

"It's called a thermostat. And at least you have a bed!"

They fell into a quick silence once more. The three onlookers exchanged wary glances.

And then Rukia leaped at Ichigo and he fell over backward, his head hitting the ground hard and her lips falling demandingly on his for only the briefest of moments before she shot to her feet and stormed away.

Ichigo was left on his back, staring up at the shocked faces of the remaining friends.

"What she didn't say is that _she's _a blanket hog too," he complained.


	7. Dream Discussion

**Warning: **Some sexual innuendo, cursing.

**Happiness and Pain**

"Dream Discussion" 

By Nessie

"You dream of a woman, King."

The sickeningly familiar voice of his inner Hollow goaded him in the ever-blank darkness of his mind. Ichigo's hand went to his hip, but in this reality he realized that he had been left weaponless.

"Don't misunderstand," the Hollow said, his voice slicker than an ice floe. "I don't want to fight you. I want to _discuss _something with you."

"If you have something to discuss," Ichigo ground out, "then stick to your topic, not what I might be dreaming about."

The Hollow's phantom imitation of him gave a broad grin. "That _is _my topic. I've been peeping in on your dreams quite a bit lately, and what do I continually find? Only that you have yearnings for that woman who sleeps in your room but not in your bed. Whose face you see before you sleep. Whether she smiles or glares, you still want her."

Using his power, he replayed the images of Kuchiki Rukia that had spread in Ichigo's unconsciousness; coal-dark hair splayed over his pillow, her small hands clenching at the sheets, her legs wrapping unrelentingly around his, calls of his name ripping from her throat as she writhes beneath him—

"Get the hell out!" Ichigo shrieked, reaching out and seizing the Hollow by the throat. The Hollow laughed in high-pitched giggles. "Stay the fuck out of my—"

"King, don't you feel it?" The Hollow did not shy away from his master's threats. "We share the need. I have asked you to allow me to take over, and here again I do so. I could procure from that pretty Rukia what you have _always _failed to."

Ichigo's breath came raggedly with his fury as the Hollow's next words came out in a hissing whisper.

"Make her ours."

Ichigo found he wasn't as weaponless as he'd thought. Drawing back, he gifted the insane Hollow with a bone-cracking punch to the jaw. The Hollow spat and snarled, but Ichigo stood firm in his own mind.

"She isn't ours," he corrected his worse side dutifully. "She's Rukia, and if she wants…maybe one day she'll be mine." This last came out more uncertainly but the Hollow only disappeared into the shadowy corners of Ichigo's consciousness.

He woke up with a start to see Rukia's face hovering over his, worry shading her plum-colored eyes. "You were muttering," she explained. "Are you all right?"

His breathing returned to normal, and he nodded slowly. "Yeah. Go back to sleep."

Rukia makes her way back to the closet, and Ichigo watches as the door slides shut, hoping his next dream will leave her alone.


	8. Convinced

**Happiness and Pain**

"Convinced" 

By Nessie

He didn't know how she did it, only that she did, and for that he absolutely _hated her_. The next time, Ichigo vowed to himself, she would never control him like that.

"But Ichigo, they don't value these lessons in Soul Society!"

"Ichigo, algebra is completely irrelevant to my duties. I just need to maintain my image while I'm in the real world!"

"I know I've asked you too much this week, Ichigo, but could you please – just this one time! – write this essay for me? I'm worried Kamika-sensei will score me badly."

And on in went, at least three nights a week if not more. Rukia always had a sturdy reason for needing his assistance on the vast majority of her schoolwork. When she was really on top of her game, she was able to kick back and relax while he did all of it himself. Ichigo didn't know why he always fell for it, only that he did.

It _could _have been because she gave him a sound kiss every night before bed.

It _could _have been because she also threatened to give him absolutely nothing if he refused to help her.

Ichigo sighed as he scribbled furiously at Rukia's English worksheet, lighted only by the desk lamp. A foot away, Rukia also scribbled – stupid pictures of bunnies on acid or something like that.

It _could _have been because he was completely, irreversibly, freakin' pathetic.


	9. Losing Face

**Happiness and Pain**

"Losing Face" 

By Nessie

He is read over and over again like a book, but no one really understands. It's like Ichigo is Greek and everyone else is not, and the meaning gets lost in translation.

Rukia is one of the few people who really get him; what it means to be someone who risks everything they have because of everything they do.

"If I were to displease my brother again, who's to say I will not be tossed back into the street?" Her eyes dim as she asks the rhetorical question.

His jaw hardens. "If I make a mistake, if I suddenly didn't win…my family could be taken, my friends could lose their faith in me. That's why it's so hard."

"To what?"

Ichigo looks at her but she keeps staring forward. He knows her eyes though, and they would be serious. "To keep being the one they all expect to be saved by. It's—"

"Embarrassing. I know." She turns to him then, a smile faint but just as real on her lips. "You've saved me." Her hand finds his, and he starts but doesn't move. "You _have _me."

And the false faces, the masks they wear to keep each other unworried and believing, slip away. Ichigo cups her cheek and kisses her, and this, at least, is not at all embarrassing.


	10. The Second Battle

**Happiness and Pain**

"The Second Battle"

By Nessie

He is discouraged by the fact that too many people, dead and alive, burden him with their dependence and don't feel any remorse. Rukia says it's because those people believe in him. Ichigo thinks it's because they are too afraid not to.

But damned if he's allowed to be afraid. He has to be strong, always, even Zangetsu agrees with that. And then come the people who say to be strong he must also learn to accept defeat and be weak, but defeat has never been an option in his line of…he hesitates to call it work. Position, perhaps. Work is done to derive a sense of satisfaction. Rescuing those needing rescued is something he has no choice in.

Intimidation is taboo. Losing is crueler than the most heartless bully, and when he does it rips him up and leaves him bleeding, burning to do it again so he can do better.

Then again…when the moment comes, and he _does _do better, Ichigo remembers that the grief of the first battle can always be forgotten in the elation of the second.

That is why he prefers the bully over the sympathizer. The bully, at least, isn't afraid to expect nothing from him.


	11. Gentlemanly Behavior

**Happiness and Pain**

"Gentlemanly Behavior"

By Nessie

"Haven't you ever heard anyone say you have to work for it?!"

This energetic demand was none by none other than Kuchiki Rukia, Shinigami, adopted noble…and tormentor. Ichigo wore a squinted look of pain that sent his sisters into uncontrollable giggle fits as he looked up at the four-foot-nine woman. Except she was currently about six-foot-nine at present because she was standing (on tiptoe) on a kitchen chair. Held high over her head was the object of his agony.

"C'mon, Rukia!" he growled. "It's the last piece of French toast! I haven't had _any _and you've had _four slices_!"

"Uh-uh," she admonished, waving a finger on her free hand. "That's not going to get it for you."

Sometimes she was such a… "Fine," Ichigo sighed. It wasn't that he couldn't wrangle the French toast from her in about three seconds. He had told himself long ago, however, that he would never manhandle Rukia in front of his family, and Kurosaki Ichigo kept his word.

Though sometimes he thought it was too much work to be a gentleman.

"What do you want?" he asked sourly.

Rukia grinned, and something told Ichigo that those were the exact words she had been waiting for. "I have a task for you," she said simply. "To get this piece of ranch toast—"

"French toast."

"That's what I said!" Sniffing haughtily, she continued. "To get this piece of French toast, you must say, 'Please, dear Rukia, – who knows all and is mightier than my Zanpakuto – will you bestow upon me the French toast'."

"That's ridiculous!" he exclaimed. "What kind of satisfaction can you even get from that?"

To emphasize her condition, she tipped the plate toward him so that the delicious-looking breakfast taunted him all by itself.

"Okay, okay," grumble Ichigo, taking a deep breath and releasing it with a glare. "Please, Rukia – who knows—"

"_Dear _Rukia."

"Please," he gritted out, "_dear_ Rukia – who knows all and is mightier than my Zanpakuto – will you…gift me with—"

"Bestow."

"Bestow! Bestow upon me the French toast?" Ichigo recited, hating her a little more with each word.

But Rukia smiled, and in one fluid step, hopped down from the chair while Karin and Yuzu shrieked with laughter. "Sure thing, Ichigo."

Later, while he was munching on the French toast – cold now but still delicious – Ichigo thought that his girlfriend was as insane as ever. But sometimes it was just easier to go with it instead of fighting.

And he continued to call her the Tormentor in his head.


	12. Hopelessly Tied

**A/N**: This is the final drabble in the Ichigo Torture series. Thanks to the IchiRukia Live Journal community for a fun event.

**Happiness and Pain**

"Hopelessly Tied"

By Nessie

Every time she tries to leave it feels like daggers tearing into his ribs, cracking bone and ripping veins. There is physical hurt, God yes, but it is nothing compared to the way her departures antagonize his feelings. He feels angry when she is gone, as though all potential for happiness is swept away in the closing of spiritual doors.

It is one of the many reasons why he followed her when she was escorted back to Soul Society. Anger is useful, it can be a tool to help refine his power, but Ichigo hardly wants to be angry all the time.

And when she returns, it is a reminder to count his losses but double-count what he has gained. Rukia is like the sewing of long, bloody gashes, like salve. The hurt is soothed, the anger ebbs, and by the time she is back in his arms, he cannot even remember what it is to hate.

It will return, that anger. But so will she.

Because in the end, Ichigo understands that destiny or fate or whatever the hell it is has them tied together, bound, whether he wants it to be that way or not.

So this time, he guesses he's just lucky. Because he _needs _it that way. He has always needed her.

**End**


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